


I'll Let the Seabirds Cry

by tbmd1066



Series: Carpet Burns and Carousels [10]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arthur Knows About Merlin's Magic (Merlin), Canon Era, Court Sorceress Morgana (Merlin), I can't be the first person to write that, M/M, Magic Ban Lifted (Merlin), Post-Magic Reveal, can't believe that's not a tag what
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:02:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25793320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tbmd1066/pseuds/tbmd1066
Summary: "What if..." Merlin swallowed against the ravenous slashing at his throat. Tears welled up behind his eyes, and his worst fear came out at last. "What if I'm not the person you love anymore?" His ribs cracked under the assault of his magic.
Relationships: Gwen/Lancelot (Merlin), Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Series: Carpet Burns and Carousels [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769542
Comments: 19
Kudos: 291





	I'll Let the Seabirds Cry

Merlin lay in bed, the first rays of sunshine illuminating the dust motes in the air. Daylight stars, his mother had called them once. He had known what they actually were, of course, and that they weren't stars at all, but he'd liked her terms all the same. Arthur stirred next to him, grunting in his sleep like a wild boar. Merlin could hear the cicadas chirping in the trees outside. The room was warm, but with a slight cool breeze from the open window. He leaned back against the soft pillows and smiled. A perfect morning. He closed his eyes, just for a moment, and called upon his magic. It flowed smoothly through him, prickling over his skin. He felt it lift him just an inch off the tangled sheets, pushing off the mattress. He floated there, eyes closed, and listened. He stretched his hearing outward, farther than he usually could. He heard the birds singing, the creaking of the castle, the stirring of the kitchen. He heard the rustling of the forest and the whisper of distant waves. If he focused, he'd hear Gaius waking and beginning his morning routine. He could hear Gwen and Lance's baby giggling, and Morgana mumbling during her morning meditation. Mostly though, he just heard Arthur's soft snores fade into a yawn.

"Good morning, love," Merlin whispered, his eyes still closed.

"M'rn'ng," Arthur mumbled back. Merlin felt the mattress dip and shift under his magic as Arthur flipped around. "Are you... floating?"

"Yeah. It's nice." He hadn't thought much about it, he'd just done it.

"Well, come back down here and kiss me." 

Merlin grinned and turned over, his weight falling slowly back to the bed, and he pressed a gentle kiss to Arthur's lips.

**_ "Þú setnes ġefeoht þa sé éower hindema anginn." _ **

Merlin's eyes snapped open as long-distant words played around his ears.  _ You will know when it is your last chance.  _ He remembered that. Those had been the words of the seer who had urged him to tell Arthur about his magic.

"What's wrong?" Arthur asked.

"Uh, nothing. I thought I heard something." A bitter dread began churning in the pit of Merlin's stomach. His magic twitched between his ribs, scratching at the walls he smothered it with. He was agitated. He wasn't sure why. 

**_ "My mum named me Merlin because I was born with my eyes glowing gold." _ **

And because he could fly before he could crawl.

"Did you hear that?" 

Arthur frowned. "No, what?"

"I don't know what-"

**_ "I know what it was. I just want to know where you learned to do it." _ **

Gaius? Merlin could have sworn it was Gaius's voice, but it sounded as though it were nearby. He tumbled off the side of the bed and staggered, dizzy. He squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. Gaius would still be in his chambers at this early hour, making breakfast and prescriptions on the same stove, which had always driven Merlin crazy. He couldn't be here. 

"Merlin?" Arthur sounded scared. He hated scaring Arthur. 

"I'm fine, just..." It felt like his magic was scratching the inside of his skull. "Give me a second, I..."

**_ "I didn't realize lying to me had become such a habit for you." _ **

"You don't hear that?" Merlin asked incredulously. His heart was pounding. Or rather, something was pounding against it. Arthur's eyes widened, and he shook his head. Merlin could tell what he was thinking. He looked crazy, and perhaps he was, hearing Arthur's voice in his head like this. 

**_ "Promise me you'll be careful. No-one can find out about you." _ **

"Mum?"

**_ "When the time is right, the truth will be known. Until then, you must keep your talents hidden. It's better for everyone." _ **

"Merlin, what's happening? What's wrong?" 

Everything. Merlin wanted to say everything, but pain was shooting through him so fast and fierce that he couldn't breathe.

**_ "I don't care who Emrys is, or that I'm supposed to marry him. I won't. I love you." _ **

He was bleeding. He must be, he could taste it. His magic was ripping him apart, trying to get out.

**_ "I was born with Magic, Arthur. It's part of me." _ **

"Merlin, what are you hearing?" Arthur was almost shouting, grabbing at Merlin's wrists and pulling them away from where the panicked mage was covering his ears. 

Merlin blinked his eyes open and saw. Things were blurred, hazy. They moved slowly, drifting like dust in the sunbeams. 

"Time."

"What?" Arthur's voice was garbled, it slowly dragged out from him as if he were drunk. 

**_ "The past was real, and the present is real, but the future does not exist." _ **

"It's things I've heard before."

**_ "Oh, great. Just what I needed. Another riddle." _ **

The air in the room seemed to bubble and expand, shifting in colour and texture, but not changing at all. Merlin could just see it now. He could see the atoms and molecules in the air, he could see time passing, slowing... 

**_ "Water looks like a family, like a mom and two kids." _ **

Merlin laughed. He must look insane right now. It hardly mattered, not when everything else looked so amazing. The sun seemed brighter, even though he knew it was more than thirty million leagues away. 

** "Magick is coming." **

"Merlin?" Arthur's voice was like a bucket of cold water. Bracing and grounding. The air was still sharpening, but when Merlin looked at Arthur, he could tell he wasn't about to float away.

"My magic is escaping," he said. "It's happening."

"Now?" Merlin nodded. Arthur took a deep breath. "Are you ready?" he asked. 

"I don't think it matters." Merlin giggled nervously. 

**_ "You've been hiding your magic out of the fear that it would get you killed for all your life." _ **

"What if..." Merlin swallowed against the ravenous slashing at his throat. Tears welled up behind his eyes, and his worst fear came out at last. "What if I'm not the person you love anymore?" His ribs cracked under the assault of his magic. 

Arthur wouldn't have looked more hurt if Merlin had stabbed him. 

**_ "What you are is wonderful." _ **

Merlin sobbed. 

**_ "But I don't know what I am." _ **

"Merlin." Arthur's voice was so gentle. 

**_ "Would you allow me the honour of learning with you?" _ **

"Merlin, there is nothing you could become that I wouldn't love." Wonderful, now they were both crying first thing in the morning. "As long as you keep your love for our people and our family, as long as you keep calling me a clotpole and telling me when I'm being thick, as long as you still love me, I will always love you."

Merlin flung his arms around Arthur's neck. He could see the hairs standing up on the back of his arms and feel the bones breaking inside them. "I'll always love you, too." 

"Does it hurt?" Arthur whispered. He must have heard the pain in Merlin's voice.

"Yeah." Merlin buried his face into Arthur's neck. "I'm so scared," he choked out, trying to laugh. It was so bright out, and daylight stars surrounded them both. 

"I'm here," Arthur said, hugging him tighter. "I've got you."

This was harder than trying to hold a bolt of lightning in his hand, and it hurt more. His magic was  _ biting  _ him! Was he bleeding on Arthur? Each tendon and ligament strained, his body trying to control something that had grown stronger than its prison. 

"I can't hold it back anymore!" he wept.

"Then let go."

For once in his life, Merlin decided to listen to Arthur's command. He went limp before he could be broken completely. For a second, everything was black, and then it felt like Merlin was exploding with light. He pushed Arthur away to protect him. 

It was the last sensation he felt. 

His entire body tingled and blurred. His magic curled and stretched as far as it could go. He tasted the salt of the ocean and heard the seabirds cry. He felt the laughter of the trees and smelled the flowers in his mother's garden in Ealdor. His world had grown since he was a child, and so had his power. Fire bubbled in his veins, and spices burned in the back of his throat; his body was being rebuilt, bone by bone, skin stretching over hot sinews. He felt strong, steady—the ground below him, the sky above, and possibility all around. 

**_ "Magick bled and burned and died." _ **

His scars itched as they were burned and sliced into his skin again, but they didn't bleed, they didn't hurt. They glowed brighter than the sun, and it made him feel better. They were the marks of his life, of his devotion to Arthur; he didn't want them to disappear. 

**_ "Everything I do, I do because I love you." _ **

He wasn't a different person, he was still Merlin. He felt the tears dry on his face. 

He was still himself, and he was free. 

**_ "I'm safe... I know that." _ **

And he felt it.

His bare feet brushed against the cold stone floor. Even before his eyes were open, he knew what he'd see: colours he'd missed for years, the atoms and components of all matter, the souls in the lives around him. He would see Arthur; the Once and Future King would be resplendent in all his beauty. 

"Merlin?" Arthur's voice sounded the same, but clearer, as though Merlin would be able to hear it from another planet. Other planets. Could he take Arthur to those distant worlds? Kiss him under the atmosphereless, star-swollen sky? He could picture it so clearly. 

**_ "If you can picture it happening, you can make it happen." _ **

He opened his eyes to find he'd never need to. All the beauty in the universe was standing right in front of him. Even if he hadn't been standing by Arthur's side for more than a decade and had never heard the prophecies, he would have recognized the missing part of his soul immediately. His soulmate. He wanted him more than anything. Merlin reached out, not with a hand, but with magic, free-flowing and vibrating with joy. He was exhilarated, but he didn't feel sick. It felt like coming home, like embracing something new and familiar all at once.

**_ "So what's it mean, then? You 'taking' me." _ **

Merlin could see Arthur's breath hitch as his magic brushed against the king's skin. 

**_ "I won't take anything you don't want to give." _ **

"Can I?" Merlin asked softly.

**_ "You can have all of me." _ **

Arthur grinned at his warlock. "Take me."

And so Merlin did. His magic seeped through Arthur's skin, touching, tasting, seeing, feeling every inch of his king. He knew Arthur better than anyone, but they had never been so intimate. He knew exactly when Arthur's knees began to buckle and caught him with a magic support at his back. 

"I can feel it." Arthur's voice shook. "Never let go, Merlin, please." He couldn't, even if he had wanted to. He was wrapped around Arthur's bones, he was growing in the marrow. He caressed every vein and muscle, kissed each goosepimple, serenaded each beautiful emotion that flowed through Arthur as liquid lightning.

Merlin pressed his lips to Arthur's and breathed him. Merlin was in Arthur's lungs, and Arthur was in Merlin's, blending and dancing until their atoms were indecipherable from one another. The jagged edges of their broken souls stitched themselves back together. Merlin's hands held Arthur's face, and his magic held his brain. The Once and Future King's legs trembled even as Emrys lifted them both from the floor. They floated, glowing golden in the air, brighter than the sun, and Magick lived.

**_ "Your union shall repair the universal bonds of magic itself and unite the lands of Albion." _ **

United together after thirty long years. They spread their roots through the earth and fed the fire of the stars. They tasted the salt of the sea and held the lives of all they loved. The universe was their home, and they were whole and free again. Magick laughed as a child, galloped with wild horses, dove with the gulls. They flew south from the cold and danced to music that they didn't know the words to. They held their mothers tight and bled for their fathers. They lived and lived and lived.

Magick ran along the neurons of reality and dreams alike, untethered and uninhibited. They were in love, and nothing could stop them because they were nothing. They held themself. They were everything, and they would never, ever be torn apart again. 

"I love this," they said.

"But we can't stay like this," they said.

"We're needed elsewhere. Things changed."

"Things always do," laughed Magick.

"I fell in love." 

"I have never felt so loved."

"We have family."

"That's amazing." 

"We have a home," Magick reminded themself.

"So full of beauty for such a little island."

"I like the patterns we make on the windows in winter."

"I like the shells we wash onto the sand."

"I love the people."

"I love our friends."

"I love you," they whispered. "I love this."

"I do, too."

"I never want to be apart from myself again."

"We won't be." Magick held themself tightly. "It's our life. This life that we've created."

"I love our life." Magick smiled, invisible in their infinity. The things that exist everywhere cannot be seen. 

"Then let's go live it."

They pulled back from the kiss. Time and space settled into the beautiful here and now. Arthur's eyes fluttered open, as blue as the sky, and Merlin could see the summer sun reflected in them. Not the sun, he realized, but him. 

His eyes were glowing.

"Hi," Arthur said, sounding dazed.

"Hi." Merlin curled his magic around Arthur's heart, feeling it beat rapidly. 

"You okay?"

"You know I am." Merlin burrowed further into Arthur's chest, both inside, with his magic, and outside, with his face. "Are you?"

Without waiting for an answer, Merlin's magic raced up Arthur's spine and into his brain to lick at his emotions. 

Arthur laughed. "Feels weird. It-it's a good weird!" He was happy, relieved, soaking in dopamine and serotonin, and Merlin felt it, too. "You're inside me." 

Merlin snickered.

"Don't be immature."

"I'm not! You said it." 

"Oh, honestly." Arthur rolled his eyes into Merlin's touch, but he didn't pull away. "You're inside my head, I meant."

"I know. Do you want me out?"

"Yes. ' _ No.' _

"Well, which is it?"

"I said yes. ' _ Obviously, I don't want you to go.' _

"Then I'll stay."

"As contrary as ever, Merlin. ' _ Thank you.' _

"Since when do you thank me?"

"What?" 

It was then that Merlin got a strange impression. A nebulous, wordless thought not prompted as the answer to a question. 

"I think I can hear your thoughts," Merlin said. ' _ Can you hear me?' _

_ 'Yes.'  _ Arthur pulled back from the hug. "Wait..." He looked adorably confused. "I'm not adorable!"

_ 'Oops. But you are. I know what this is. This is a thing the druids can do, a way of communicating.' _

_ 'Why can we do it now?' _

Merlin beamed at his king.  _ 'Because we're married.' _

"We are?!" Arthur practically shouted. 

"Didn't you feel it?"

"I..." Arthur's brow wrinkled in thought, and Merlin reached out with his magic to smooth it.  _ 'I did feel it. That's what it was, wasn't it?' _

"Honestly, what about our lives hasn't felt like marriage for years now, anyway?"

Arthur laughed and kissed him, and there it was, that spark that bonded them. Delicious and exhilarating. The universe narrowed, and it was just them. Two husbands in their bedchamber together. 

_ 'I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you." _

_ 'Arthur, if you get me talking while we're kissing, you'll never be able to shut me up again.' _

_ 'We'll see about that.'  _ Arthur smiled against his lips and hoisted the most powerful sorcerer to ever walk the earth into his arms. Merlin wrapped his legs around Arthur's waist and giggled as he walked them back to the bed. He couldn't help laughing, it was funny. Merlin was the stronger of the pair.

"Having a hard time carrying me?"

"Not at all," Arthur grunted.

Merlin's magic pushed them off the ground and flipped them. Arthur landed on his back, Merlin floating down to straddle his hips. 

"What about now?"

Arthur blinked in surprise and then grinned salaciously. "I might be having a bit of a hard time now."

"Oh, gross!" 

And quite suddenly, the universe expanded beyond their embrace. Merlin actually jumped five feet in the air. He flipped around quite impressively before innocently sitting on the edge of the bed and smiling politely at the woman standing in their doorway.

"Morgana, you can't just barge into my room!" Arthur shouted.

"I've been knocking!" she shouted back. "And as your court sorceress, actually, yes I can. You should come to see what's going on out here."

_ 'I'd have had you come doing something else,'  _ Merlin whispered into his husband's mind. Arthur squeaked.

"Put some clothes on first, the pair of you," Morgana scowled before slamming the door closed behind her. "Disgusting!" they could still hear her yell from the hall. 

"I'm wearing clothes." Merlin looked down at himself. "Oh, no, I'm not. Where did my pajamas go?"

"I think they burned off when you were doing your very impressive imitation of a wildfire."

"I didn't even  _ notice! _ Fuck, do you think Morgana saw?"

"I  _ don't  _ want to talk about whether my sister just saw you naked."

"She definitely did. I'm dying, Arthur."

"How do you think I feel?!" Arthur tumbled off the bed and started rooting around in their cupboard for some clothes. Merlin looked around for where his clothes might have gone and found only a pile of ashes on the floor.

"I liked those trousers," Merlin grumbled, tucking the ashes away into a pocket dimension populated solely by vanished objects. 

"Here." Arthur tossed him a non-charred pair of trousers and smallclothes. "Hurry up, I don't want to keep her waiting."

"I don't think I can ever look her in the eye again," Merlin said, getting dressed anyways. 

"You'll have to, especially with such gorgeous eyes." Arthur leaned in for a deep kiss.

_ 'I thought we were in a hurry.' _

Arthur pulled back and tossed a shirt on. "Okay. We'll go see what's got Morgana into a tizzy, and  _ then  _ you're going to pin me to the bed with the full force of your magic."

"I'd crush you."

Arthur groaned. "Promise?"

"You need to calm down." Merlin wasn't entirely sure which one of them he was talking about. 

"Then you had better put a shirt on, please."  _ 'Or don't.' _

"On it." Merlin grabbed an old red shirt and wriggled into it. "Did you put on socks?"

"Let's just  _ go."  _ Arthur grabbed his arm and dragged him out the door. Each footstep jolted through Merlin, and his newly regained senses tingled. Every time his foot connected with the cool stone, he could feel the entire castle and everything in it. 

"Did you know that there are five rooms in the castle that have no doors or windows? They're just empty and totally sealed off."

"That's great, Merlin," said Morgana, staunchly avoiding his gaze. "But I think I have something more interesting." She beckoned for them to follow and started off down the hall. She stopped at an open section overlooking the courtyard and pointed. "Look."

Merlin and Arthur gasped. The tree in the centre of the courtyard had only been planted three years ago, but it towered much higher than it had the day before. It wasn't the only plant that had decided on a growth spurt, apparently. The entire courtyard was coated in green. Magical flowers that Merlin just Knew hadn't regrown after Arthur's birth were blooming wide and full under the bright sun. The sunlight...it bent at impossible angles, glittering in ways it hadn't before. It ran through everything like veins, not just light, but magic. 

"Can you see this, too?" Merlin whispered, not daring to speak loudly, lest everything disappear. 

"It just  _ happened, _ " Morgana gestured. "The lights started in the castle somewhere, and they've been spreading. I don't know what it is."

"It's us." Arthur smiled. He turned to Merlin. "Isn't it?"

Merlin nodded. "It's beautiful."

"Of course it's beautiful," Morgana said. "And I have a good feeling about it, but we don't know what it is or why it's happened."

"It's because we got married," said Merlin.

"What?!" Merlin flinched at the noise. Trust Morgana to be able to yell at him in multiple planes of reality. 

"We got married," Arthur answered since his were the ears that weren't ringing. 

"When?!"

Merlin curled his magic around Arthur's shoulders. It seemed quite content to linger within him. "This morning."

Morgana stared at them. "...In your bedchamber?"

"Yep." Arthur nodded.

"Without inviting anyone."

"Well-"

"In your pajamas!?"

"No, Merlin was naked."

"Arthur!"

"Please don't remind me." Morgana pinched the bridge of her nose the same way Arthur did when he was frustrated with a conversation. "How did you two eloping cause magical lights to start spreading through the city?"

Merlin brushed his fingers over a light on the railing and shivered. He could see the whole of Albion. Every river, valley, mountain, mapped out in intricate and perfect detail. "It's not just the city," he said. "It's all of Albion, it's..."

"United." Merlin looked up at Arthur, his fingers just millimetres away from Merlin's.  _ 'I feel it, too.'  _

"What the fuck is going on with you two?" She finally managed to make eye contact with Merlin. "And what happened to your eyes?" She gasped. "Oh, you did it, didn't you?"

Merlin nodded. Morgana knew that he'd been trying to release his magic for ages now, as did most of their friends. "It feels so good, Morgana." 

She smiled and looked out at the overgrown courtyard. "And it did this? Okay, I guess maybe you are more powerful than me."

Merlin laughed. "Don't worry, I'm hardly after your job."

"No, you're after my little brother."

Arthur wrapped an arm around Merlin's face and dropped his head down on the mage's shoulder. "He's already got me."

"Come on." Merlin slipped an arm around Arthur and grabbed Morgana's hand. He carried them up the veins of Albion to the rooftop of the palace where they could see Camelot stretching out before them. 

The sky sparkled with real daylight stars, bright pinpoints of light glittering in a perfect blue. Plants were growing out of all the cobblestones, flowers and trees both. The air was full of joyous birdsong. The people were milling about, marvelling at the lights running through the isle, touching them and exclaiming in wonder. 

"We made this," he said. "The three of us, we made this together."

"Well, mostly you two." Morgana smiled. 

"Are you kidding?" Merling cried. "We could never have done this without you!"

"I know; I was kidding. You two would be dead without me." 

"Okay, I wouldn't go that far," Arthur muttered. Merlin felt Morgana poke his husband in the ribs.

"No, she's right," he said. "She's definitely saved my life, and we all know I'm the only thing keeping you alive, Arthur."

"Oh, shut up," Arthur grumbled, poking Morgana back. 

"Don't push!" she shrieked. "We're on the roof, you barbarian!" 

"I barely touched you!"

"Good grief, you two Pendragons are ridiculous." Merlin rolled his eyes.

"Us three Pendragons," said Arthur.

"Eh?" Merlin looked at him in confusion.

"Morgana, Arthur, and Merlin Pendragon." Arthur smiled. "You're one of us now, dear husband."

Warmth radiated through Merlin's husband, through his magic, to his tender, healing soul.

"You two are going to have a fun time telling that to the council, aren't you? You'd better have a proper wedding, is all I'm saying because I've been aching to have a reason to dress Merlin up for years now, and you've never let me!"

"I'm not a doll, Morgana."

"She's got a point, though," said Arthur. "Will you marry me, Merlin Pendragon?"

"Of course I will, I've been very clear about it on multiple occasions." 

"And will you let me plan your wedding, Merlin Pendragon?" Morgana grinned. 

"Absolutely not." Merlin wasn't sure if it was his magic manipulating time again or if he was merely having vivid flashbacks to Morgana's tyrannical planning of Gwen and Lancelot's wedding. "There's no way you're depriving me of the joy of making Arthur pick between two napkins that are the same colour but different textures."

"You two are evil." Arthur's words may have been snippy, but he pulled the two mages closer to him. "But I'm glad you taught me that that's just because of your terrible personalities, and not the 'corrupting forces of magic.' I wouldn't have missed this for the world."

Morgana leaned into her brother's side. "Oh, Arthur...You're so bad at being sweet."

"Don't worry, Morgana, we have the rest of our lives to work on him."

"What did I say? Stop laughing, you-what did I say?"

The future may not have been real, but Merlin swore he could almost see it stretching out in front of them, and it was beautiful. 

**Author's Note:**

> Some thoughts:  
> Morgana: You said you were gonna write the wedding  
> Me: This is the wedding  
> Morgana: It fucking isn't.
> 
> Don't be fooled by the sweet closing sentence! I got more of this series in my system. However, chronologically, this is a perfectly fine place to end. I definitely want to write how other people react to Merlin having his magic loose, especially Gwaine, since I haven't written him at all. Oh, and Hunith! I have other parts I'm working on that will fit in here earlier than this, like I said in This Here Is Not Singing, I want to write more of Merlin dealing with his anxiety. 
> 
> Title is from The Amazing Devil's song "King."


End file.
